söndag, november 23, 2008

Genesis 37 – 50 The word eunuch is not used for Joseph. He simply is (and the traditional typos for "a Joseph”). Maybe people in pre modernity were less occupied with categorising, than we are in medically defining Modernity...

Daniel and Aspenas post exile Daniel (written c:a 167 BC) but erroneously put as a prophet following he book of Hezekiah, has Asfanéks tw arxieunoúxw auto; Asfanex, his Arch-Eunuch, already in verse 3 of the first Chapter (second Chapter in Bibles which follow the LXX. Most translations, however, delete the 3 additions to Daniel (c:a 100 BC); The Story of Susanna (Chapter 1), The fiery Furnace + The Prayer of the 3 Men (Dan 3.24ff), Bel and the Serpent god (last).

Matthew 19:11-12, does indeed state eunuch, for all who are not the marrying kind. Those who are born, those who were made by men, and those who have made themselves for the Kingdom.

Luke 7:1-9 and Matthew 8:5-13 The words used here are doûlos; slave (in Luke), and o paîs mou; my boy (in Matthew, in some manuscripts also o paîs autoû; his boy, in verse 13). Paîs and doûlos are interchangeable; both children and servants are juniors, not grown ups (cf how non-white servants are treated in old films).

The point here is that the slave/boy (regardless of actual age) is most dear, indeed irreplaceable, to the Centurion. Otherwise there wouldn’t be a story to tell. But it's not by Mark, only by Luke – and the late Matthew-evangelists (changing Luke).

Some more late modern, anti Modern, distortions:

1 Thess 4:3-7 From Lateran II in 1134 this (especially verse 3) was regarded as a “proof” for Mandatory Celibacy and used for consecrations, also in the Swedish tradition. However, Mandatory Celibacy never reached the Swedish Church Province; Sweden and Finland. Here (and in the small Province of Island) long after Lateran IV 1215, Priests and Bishops were married – the remaining “house-keepers” were finally banned in the 1530ies and asked to be wed. Occasionally bishops demanded “fines” and took money for marriages and "dispensations", though...

In the last State translation NT 1981 + OT 2000 (made by two converts to Rome, one official, one secret ;=) verse 4 tò eautoû skeûos; his own body, became “his wife”, proving Neo Platonist subject/object ex-changing Misogyni is well and kicking… The converts/translators claim a Rabbinic reading as support – they often do, nowadays...

Verse 6 was turned into yet another anti Gay passage, but not really in the translation itself, but in the foreword some editions add (Free Church, i.e. Calvinist Bibles). The Danish Bible (1992), however, still talks of honesty towards others in commerce in verse 6.

2 Peter 2:4 In the 1981 State translation this became Misogynic. ofthalmoùs moixalídos; deceitful eyes, (masc. plur.) being rendered “They only have eyes for wanton women”. Oh! the Daughters of Eve!

Also, in the Swedish State 1981 1 Cor 7:21 has suddenly become pro slavery! This comes from a headline (misinterpreted) in Roman Pater Zerwicks 1966 so called Grammatical analysis (it often doesn't analyse, but give the "official" Roman interpretation instead ;=). Instead of “take advantage of it; try to become free!” as still in the 1917, 1981 says “Even if you can become free, don’t bother”. Sweet!

alias Jude verse 7 This late Alexandrian writ (end of 2nd century) of dubious value (plenty of Gnosticisms: Fall of the Angels, in verse 6, Ascent of Moses, in verse 8, the Wives of Sodom going after sarkòs etéras; the Archons from Genesis 8, in verse 7, and Book of Enoch, in verse 10), the pagan original or which has been preserved (2nd Peter 2 is a version of the same), also is quite novel as anti Gay, late modern in fact only appearing post Bailey, in this case around 1978, sarkòs etéras being, of course, interpreted as men having sex with men, but oddly enough, the Swedish State 1981 also spells out (adding) the ancient Gnostic nonsense of the Wives of Sodom lusting for the Angels…

This gloss is much distorted in (especially late modern) translations. Ai tä gàr thäleiai autån does not mean “even their women”…. their c-ts would be correct, the word thäxä means shaft...

Thälu is so Misogynic not even the Misogynic Pastorals use it!

Tän fusikän xräsin is the usual use, another 4-letter word. The xräsin which is parà fúsin, is besides the usual. Dative. That is, in this case, being used from behind... Woman is for ever an object, to Hellenism…

The men are eksexaúthäsan; inflamed, with Passion, dis-honour-able Passion. But the object is turned not only front/back, but outwards in; the women are described as subjects of the phrase, although being objects, being used...

“The right use of women” according to Hellenism – procreation – is what is addressed.

And it’s mis-take, not “error” as in most translations. Just a mis-take – and its interesting after a Millennium of ever worsening propaganda, to read the old Byzantine hater Patriarch Johannes Chrysostomos (Mouth-of-Chrisma) – for certain anti Gay and anti Jewish – (Epist. Ad Rom. Homilia IV, in Migne: Patrologia graeca XII, 1862, p. 415-416), gently taking much later anti gay propa-ganda to pieces, explaining passion as the mis-take of the men madly burning with lust – all words from Romans 1.

Translation from page 415 in Migne, of Joh. Chrys’s Academic Greek (very different from Bible Greek or Koíne, so somewhat leaning on Migne’s Latin translation) “[Paulos] rids them of every excuse in this case, teaching that their women “exchanged the natural use”. One cannot say, he remarks, that they did this being denied lawful intercourse, or that they were forced to this madness because they couldn’t fulfil their want.

Only those may exchange something that have it. Thus he taught: “They exchanged God’s truth against a lie.”

About the men it’s the same, but with a different expression, with the words “they quit the natural use of woman”. Equally he denies them with these words any excuse when he shows not only that they possessed pleasure, but left it in the pursuit of another; dis-honouring the one which was according to their nature, they sought another which was beyond their nature.

That persons of the same gender fall in love obviously was a rather neutral matter in the 1st Millennium, even for someone like Joh. Chrys. “Burning” wasn’t, “Lust” wasn’t, “Madness” wasn’t.

According to Mona West, one of the authors of The Gay Bible Commentary, Johannes Chrysostomos is one of the first, who around 400 AD effaced the character of Daniel and others in the Bible, as Eunuchs. Eunuchs being very much visible (and unpopular) in Court and Church (“the heavenly whining” of the castratos) in the Byzantion of the day (as in other grand pre Modern courts. There are still some very old ex courtier eunuchs around in Turkey and China to this day).

But as suggested above, the very word Eunuch is absent from most translations today. Thank you Chrys!

1 Cor 6.9-11 The focus of this passage, as much of the Bible written in the order of the 10 Commandments, is primarily loyalty to the Household, moixeía; 7th Commandment, oúte moixoì, oúte malakoì, oúte arsenokoîtai.

Originally it’s the Husbander’s, the pater familias’ loyalty towards his House (think Count Almaviva in Figaro as the opposite attitude malakós; sloppy, in Greek; forgetful of his House, ever pursuing his little pleasures). The 10 Commandments originally having been written to the Husbander in the 2nd person masculine imperative! With Ezraism (398 BC) this devolved on the members individually; each man. Even poor members of the local Synagogue were Heads of their own Household.

This represents an individualisation; indeed the first emancipa-tion of Humanity.

With Paul the Household becomes the House-Congregation, the living Body of Christ. Whatever breach of the 7th Commandment, indeed the past itself, has vanished in Baptism: 1 Cor 6:11

“All this you were, but you washed yourselves and were sanctified and made righteous in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ, and in the Sprit of our God. Amen”

alias 1 Tim 1:10 The word used in this mid 2nd century “parallel” to 1st Cor 6:9-11 (probably old Polycarp’s boys in Smyrna, after Polycarp’s death in AD 154/5) is a different form from arseno-koîtai; bedfellow (translated so in the Old Latin; masculorum concubitores, perhaps only 75 years after Paul), dative plural, arsenokoítais; men in bed-s. This passage wasn’t translated the same as 1 Cor 6:9 before the 1960ies, probably because as a different form, and a different word it was considered different.

alias 1 Tim also beats Paul by the number of Commandments addressed; 6 against 4 (most later so called "Catalogues of Sin" have only 2 or less ;=). The focus in these are not the 10 Commandments, but congregational discipline; obedience – in some translations Godly obedience… As usual in the NT some Commandments are never mentioned, such as the Great 4th, the Sabbath.

Judges 19:22 This was not read (even less translated) as anti Gay before Bailey 1955, that is, it appears only after it was conclu-sively shown that the Sodom story was material; indifference in the face of God’s suffering Creation, not sexual Gnosticist, and that, moreover, the anti Gay reading of the Sodom story was Hellenist, inter Testamental at best, and never part of any Tradition before Integrism, the new “proof”-reading of 16th century Renaissance (itself a resurgence from the schools of Antiquity). In defence of the indefensible most late modern Bibles (starting with the English language Jerusalem Bible 1966) ína gnåmen autón; that we may know him = say hello to him, is rendered “that we may abuse him”.

I had planned to extend this piece but my old concordance has no word eunuck and my Bible 2000 CD isn’t really searchable for words… I thought computors were made for such (not to mention fudamentalist CDs). So, not being very Bible-savvy, I’ll simply add a few observations.

Genesis 18-19 The word in Genesis 19:5 as I have said various times in different places is sungenåmetha autoîs, which means “say hello to them”. The aorist present gnåmen autois which some try to put here (in translations) is a different word altogether, which in the imperfect only e-gnå-, may be a euphemism for (“hetero-sexual”) intercourse, circumstances permitting (which they do in a total of 9 places; 8 in the OT (mainly in Genesis) and 1 in the NT (Matthew 1:25). The root gnå- occurs 934 times in the Bible – 9 egnå- out of 934 gnå- seems to me a total of less than 1%.

Hardly the Rule, but the exception - and it's never "homo-sexual". However, anti Modern "translators" insist on this distortion.

Leviticus 18:22 This is about Koitän gunaikòs; the Wife’s Bed, the only Bed there was in an Antique household. It’s debatable whether the one Bed belonged to the husband or the wife, but both slept in it. The Household itself slept on mats and cots on the floor, or on the roof (in Europe in attics well into the 20th century). What the verse says in the Greek LXX, the Septuagint (the first translation and as such the first interpretation); in fact the first complete Bible, from the Jewish congregation in Alexandria around 100 BC, is kaì metà ársenos ou koimethäsä koitän gunaikòs; “and with a man don’t put yourself in the Bed of a wife”. Quite simply. It’s occupied. 3 is one too many.

The Mazoretic text (c:a 900 AD) seems to be damaged here (there seems to be an im; in, missing), having lost the Bed (at least in translations). But it probably was there originally also in Hebrew.

In the West, the text remained as in the LXX for very long, i.e. in the Old Latin (North Africa, 2nd century onwards). It was only the ideological changes in the very reliable Old Latin translation around 1200 in Paris (the Scholastic Versio Vulgata, with a little help from the holes in the damaged Hebrew text ;=), which caused this to be the very different version we know today, centred on the Spilling of Semen (a Gnosticist Idea) and social discipline (Empire), by way of reading Koitän; the Bed, as a 2nd verb “sleep together sexually”, cf our medical Macaroni coitus ;=) and gunaikòs; (of the) Wife, as “womanly” - Oh! the Daughters of Eve…

Post 16th century Renaissance translators do the same trick with any passage where Koitän appears.

The French Bible de Jerusalem translation (1955) is the only one I’ve found, which retains the original Bed - all others go for the Macaroni.

Leviticus 20:13 the same (a parallel) re-written as secular law (If a man does, then…)

Romans 1:26-27 This gloss (to my mind probably added by Platonist Clement of Alexandria of Fables fame, around 180) expresses the Hellenist popular philosophical preoccupation with the ideal of a-pathía. All feelings páthä; passions, are a-timías; dis-honourable to the philosophically minded, especially if strong...

The passage as a whole (Romans 1:18-32) expresses Museioon’s Idea of a Fall of Humanity from an original (= Good ;=) Idea of a non personal Highest Being, to (cf Shinto of Japan) the base “gods” of Mount Olympus (humans, birds, four footers, and crocodiles, as in Romans 1:23 and Deuteronomium 5:8).

I very much question if such a mixis of Hellenist and Biblical was even possible in Paul’s time.

fredag, november 21, 2008

Not only do the 6 so called clobber verses not address GLBT or ”homosexuality” (a medical term from 1869, which has changed its meaning twice since then…) in any way (ancient, pre modern, Modern or late modern), as sometimes is claimed from Rome and American Political Calvinism in late modernity. For instance the Sodom story (Genesis 18-19) is about the Command to Hospitality towards “the Levite, the poor and the stranger”, as Deuteronomy says – a question of survival for those excluded from pre modern Societies). The Passages which really address GLBT-folks are quite different.

Furthermore, the distortion of the Sodom story as sexual comes, as D. S. Bailey showed 1955 in his Homosexuality and the Western Christian Tradition (causing some 45 references in the Bible, some by Jesus himself like Matt 10:15, 11:24, to be re-directed in translations after c:a 1960 from sexual to material) from 1st century Hellenist Popular Philosophical literature, incl. Philosophically challenged Philo of Alexandria (of the Museioon) and double traitor “Flavius” Josephus, né Levi (of 1st Jewish war fame, which caused the destruction of Jerusalem, for the infinitesimal time…) who never have been kosher in Judaism or Christianity, but have been exceedingly admired by anti Modern academics.

Places which do talk of GLBT-folk are for instance Genesis 37 – 50 (Joseph in Egypt, particularly Potiphar’s wife’s failed attempt at seduction, Genesis 37:9), Ruth’s Book (it is Ruth who says to Naomi “until death do us part”, Ruth 1:16-17) and, of course, 1st Samuel 16 to 1st Kings 2, with the well-known story about David’s ascent to power and his love for Jonathan (e.g. 1st Samuel 18:1-3) and King Saul, and his daughters Merab (1st Samuel 18:21) and Mikal (1st Samuel 18:28), particularly the Partnership formula 1st Samuel 20:42 (binding the descendants!) and Saul’s jealousy (“Thou son of a Harlot” in 1st Samuel 20:30)…

More Eunuchs (cf hidjra in contemporary India) besides Joseph are found in Isaiah 56 (where the god-fearing eunuch and the stranger are praised), Daniel’s Book (Daniel and Aspenas, and others). In the New Testament there are for instance Matthew 19:11-12 (“there are some who by birth, from the mother's womb are such" - i.e. not suited to marry) Luke 7:1-9 and Matthew 8:5-13 (the Centurion’s servant – Mark! the stories in Luke and Matt are quite dissimilar), and Acts 8:26-39 (another eunuch).

“Joseph” is by the way an old byname for GLBT, “Oh, had I been in Joseph’s predicament, Oh! had I been in Joseph’s predicament – I know what I’d done!” late 18th century singer-songwriter Charles Michael Bellman says (Fredman’s Song Nr 38) or “Joseph ein Joseph war” as I read somewhere about his friend and collabo-rator (e.g. "Adieu my dear child!" on the death of Bellman's son Elis) Joseph Martin Kraus. Both referring to the episode with Potiphar’s wife…

And this is authentically Biblical. The anti Modern hysteria may be admired in the present Government Alliance's dithering (over the Pentecostal "Christian" Democrat Party's pains) over Marriage legislation being made Gender neutral in December this year.

Inspired by a post on Elizabeth M. Kaeton's Telling Secrets click on the headline!

lördag, november 01, 2008

The letter was around already the last time (Election of 2004), but is a good introduction to today's issue: Cheating at Elections. The Presidential elections are fast approaching in a USA which does not generally use paper-ballots, as everybody else, and the discussion is on again about un-reliable electronic voting-machines (e.g. in Ohio) and how the American elections may be stolen (if any of the Parties are less than honourable). Click on the Headline!

Much more, for instance about Oprah Winfrey and what happened to her in Chicago, Illinois this week in this very election, may be read on Brad Blog

The Times of London, which is owned by an Australian; Robert Murdoch, and has sent reporters to the USA for much-raking... has the story about presidential candidate Senator Obama's aunt, who lives illegally in Boston since four years back, after her bid for asylum was rejected and now also has given money to her nephews campaign, which is not allowed for non-Americans.

The idea that giving money for a campaign is not allowed for non-citizens (which I find reasonable) falls on its head, however, when one reads about a Swede who has gone to the USA to work for Senator John McCain.

Which is it, really? That some animals are more equal than others???

-------------------------- November 3rd:

Link to The Huffington Post about voting problems, queues, & c., is here